The Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs hosted the official graduation ceremony for the fourth cohort of the program "New Cadres for a New Belarus".
This diplomatic training program was initiated in 2020 by the Centre for Eastern European Studies at the University of Warsaw, with the support of the National Anti-Crisis Management (NAM). Since the end of 2020, the Polish MFA has provided organizational and financial assistance for the annual training of diplomats for the New Belarus. So far, 74 future diplomats have been trained as part of the program.
The primary goal of the diplomatic course is to create a reserve of personnel for the diplomatic service of the New Belarus. The course covered theory and practice in politics and diplomacy, foreign policy and security, diplomatic protocol, international law, analysis of the political situation in Belarus and the post-Soviet space, among other topics. Participants of the program received lectures from European diplomats and professors from Polish and foreign universities.
The instructors of the program included faculty from the University of Warsaw and the Diplomatic Academy of the Polish MFA, as well as invited guests such as former U.S. Ambassador to Poland Daniel Fried, Minister in the Chancellery of the President of Poland responsible for international policy Mieszko Pawlak, the Polish MFA’s Special Representative for Cooperation with Democratic Forces of Belarus, Ambassador Artur Michalski, the head of NAM, Ambassador Pavel Latushka, and Deputy Head of NAM, Ambassador Vladzimir Astapenka.
Symbolically, the diploma ceremony took place in the Jerzy Giedroyc Hall of the Polish MFA, where the head of the diplomatic service and the general director of the MFA, Rafał Wiśniewski, delivered a speech. Pavel Latushka, Deputy Head of the United Transitional Cabinet and head of NAM, also addressed the graduates, emphasizing that personnel training is a priority for the UTC. He noted that the theoretical and practical knowledge acquired by these young future diplomats will be crucial in forming the new diplomatic corps of Belarus. Latushka underlined that a cadre potential has essentially been prepared to ensure the operation of the MFA of the New Belarus during the transitional period. The ceremony was attended by directors of various departments of the Polish MFA.
At the conclusion of the program, 16 graduates received diplomas. Participants from all four cohorts are already working for democratic Belarus, including within the Coordination Council, NAM, the "Honest People" initiative, and other Belarusian democratic organizations.
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